“I was focused on the egg part.”
“The egg part isonepart. There arefourparts. Egg. Muffin. Canadian bacon. Sauce.” Stella pulled on her jacket. “I’ll get lemons. You practice. And maybe clean the ceiling.”
She walked to the market on Forest Avenue—ten minutes, downhill. Eggs, lemons, a bag of english muffins, and a package of Canadian bacon because she had a feeling Tyler hadn’t thought about any of it beyond the egg. She texted Bea from the checkout line.
Going to Margo’s for better lemons. Her tree.
Tell Margo I said hi. Also tell her Tyler is trying to cook and she should probably know that.
Margo knows. She was at the meeting.
She knows in theory. She doesn’t know about the ceiling.
Stella dropped the groceries at the bungalow and walked to Margo’s—four blocks, the kind of walk that was Laguna at its best in October.
The house was quiet from the outside—curtains open, porch light off, the garden that Eleanor’s committee had been tending looking slightly more organized than Margo preferred. Stella knocked and let herself in, because that was how Margo’s house worked. You knocked as a formality and entered as a family member.
Margo was in the kitchen with a cup of tea and the newspaper spread across the table. She looked up over her reading glasses.
“Stella. To what do I owe?—”
“Lemons. Do you have lemons? We need them for hollandaise. Eventually.”
Margo set down her tea. “Who is making hollandaise?”
“That’s a developing situation. Tyler’s handling the eggs. The hollandaise is... aspirational.”
“Tyler is making eggs Benedict.”
“Tyler is attempting eggs Benedict.”
“Tyler who burned the?—”
“Yes.”
Margo took off her reading glasses and folded them slowly. “How many eggs has he gone through?”
“Ten. Two left. I bought more.” Stella held up her empty hands. “But your lemons are better than the market’s.”
“My lemons are better than everyone’s.” Margo stood and headed for the back door. The lemon tree in her yard was a point of pride she pretended wasn’t a point of pride. She’d been growing it for thirty years and it produced fruit that made everything else taste like it had been manufactured.
Stella held the bag open while Margo picked lemons, turning each one in her hand the way she turned everything — checking, weighing, deciding.
“How bad is it?” Margo asked. “At Tyler’s.”
“The ceiling has egg on it.”
“The ceiling.”
Margo dropped another lemon in the bag and looked at Stella. The corner of her mouth twitched not quite a smile, not quite a wince. The look of a woman who wanted to go fix it and was choosing not to.
“Tell Tyler to lower the heat. The water should barely move. And use a small bowl—crack the egg into the bowl first, then slide it in. Don’t drop it.”
“I’ll tell him.”
“And the hollandaise—when you get there—needs to be warm, not hot. If it breaks, add an ice cube and whisk.”
“Got it.”
